Xmas gift from Iowa for all the good little ecig fans

No, I am not talking about the chocolates that Julie Woessner sent out to CASAA workers and BOD members. (Thanks for those Julie. And also, you’re welcome — for me making the effort to point this out to the world, thereby making sure anyone who you missed will get in touch with you and help you correct your oversight. :-)

I am talking about this pro-ecig press release from Iowa Attorney General Thomas J. Miller. It has some mildly incorrect and naive bits, though none that are intentionally anti-THR. I am also a wee bit annoyed about the formatting that does not allow copy-paste. But I am going to just go positive today and quote (retype :-< ) the good bits.

The harm of the combustible cigarettes is dramatically greater than the harm of the e-cigarette. …. …whatever number is correct, e-cigarettes are dramatically less harmful than combustible cigarettes.

There has been an effort to say that combustible cigarettes and e-cigarettes are equally harmful…and that they should be strongly regulated the same way. This view is incorrect, but it has gotten significant traction. Polling indicates that 32% of Americans believe that combustible cigarettes and e-cigarettes are equally harmful. This means that as many as 13 million adult smokers believe them to be equally harmful, and are very unlikely to switch when switching may save their lives. People making misstatements about e-cigarettes have the best of intentions [sic] — to keep kids from being addicted [sic] to nicotine through e-cigarettes. But adults misleading kids to get them to do what we want has always been a failed strategy.

Sorry, had to quote the lame bit in the middle to get to the great payload at the end of that. Which leads into the awesome bit:

There is also a misconception about the prevalence of teen e-cigarette smoking [sic]. According to the National Youth Tobacco Survey, 13% of American high school students smoked [sigh] an e-cigarette once or more in the last 30 days. This includes regular use and experimental use. As the figure is repeated, the number 13% is used without that qualification. After a few repetitions, people then tend to assume that 13% are regular users. However, regular use — if defined by usage in 20 or more days in the last 30 days — is actually 2%. The numbers should be seen together — 13% used e-cigarettes once or more in the last 30 days; 2% have used an e-cigarette 20 or more days in the last 30 days.

I could not have said it better myself. And special kudos for:

The combustible cigarette is by far the most harmful consumer product known to mankind

This is a version of that claim that is actually defensible (though cars probably actually edge out cigarettes by most reasonable measures), unlike the more common versions I shredded in the previous post.

Imagine that. A government official who in spite of not being an expert on the science (as evidenced by some of the bits I did not quote) is a critical thinker who can see right through the obvious bullshit, and who then calls them on it.

4 responses to “Xmas gift from Iowa for all the good little ecig fans”

“… the prevalence of teen e-cigarette smoking [sic]” That caught my eye and reminded me of yesterday, when the European Union’s Court of Justice Advocate General, Juliana Kokott, issue her interim advice about a legal challenge to the EU’s proposed legislation on vaping. It included the phrase “smoking an ecigarette”. It was very striking in this context. I believe it shows that at some psychological level the anti-vaping lobby is in some way equating tobacco smoking and vaping in some murky and hardly definable way, especially in connection with their claim that it could ‘renormalize’ smoking. I’m unsure even if the word vaping occurs in her report. The connection between the word ecigarette and smoking is so strong in those with little or no knowledge of vaping that it colours their opinion, leading to them misrepresenting the situation.
Does it need to be said that her report did not address the key points of the challange, and effectively just repeated the same bad logic and lack of evidence we’ve seen in recent years? Her conclusions were actually quite shocking though, in the context of an apparently independent legal thinker, who one would have assumed was more capable of logical reasoning, free of unproven assumptions. It does not bode well for the final judgment, whenever that may be (soon).http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2015-12/cp150154en.pdf

People who have never used tobacco, and can’t imagine why anyone in their right mind would want to, usually share the same set of facile misconceptions about tobacco and nicotine; and, by extension, about vapor products. Unfortunately, this is a group that includes pretty much 100% of the world’s relevant policymakers.

Please note, however, that Tom Miller also signed the following letters advocating FDA’s proposed e-cig deeming ban and many more unwarranted e-cig regulations, and urging the country’s largest retail chains to follow CVS’s lead by ending tobacco and vapor product sales.

Perhaps Miller’s recent press release was actually written for himself, his fellow AGs and his fellow board members at Legacy, who have manufactured and repeated the false claims Miller is now properly criticizing, and who have aggressively lobbied FDA to ban e-cig sales to adults by deceitfully claiming the regulation protects children.

If Miller truly believes what he wrote, he would urge the White House to reject FDA’s e-cig deeming ban, and would stop advocating public vaping bans (which are all based on false fear mongering claims).

Tobacco Harm Reduction (THR)

THR is the public health strategy of encouraging smokers to switch to low-risk alternatives like smokeless tobacco and e-cigarettes. It is the only proven method for reducing smoking below about a fifth of the population once it becomes established. (So why would anyone be anti-THR? See the "About" page.)

The continuing scourge of [smoking]-produced disease is unlikely to yield to today’s "evidence-based" interventions. (scare quotes added) Kenneth E Warner; see post if the implications are not obvious

If someone says the sky is green, you prove that it’s actually blue, and the next day he comes back once again insisting that the sky is green, and this happens repeatedly, you eventually have to acknowledge that mannerly debate about the color of the sky just isn’t enough; you have to go meta, and talk about the fact that this guy and his friends just aren’t in the business of honest discussion. Paul Krugman

He who is merciful to the cruel will become cruel to the merciful. Ancient Midrash